Page 21 of A Family Affair: The Cabin
The shock on her face gave him a small amount of satisfaction. So, she really hadn’t known who he was. Well, now she did. “He’s the man I told you about, remember? The one who gave me a hard time and pretty much kicked my lazy butt out of town? He’s also the best person I know, and your allegiance to that Blacksworth woman is going to hurt him. I don’t know how Nate Desantro’s going to take it, but it wasn’t your secret to tell.” Pete swore under his breath. “I am so damn tired of this conversation.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“You’re sorry? Save the ‘sorry’s’ and the tears. It’s too late for them. It only mattered when you could have told me the truth and didn’t.” Logic told him to stop here and let it go, but logic had vanished the second he met this woman. “Last night I told you I was from Magdalena, and I told you about the Desantros. You had to have figured I had a connection to them if I was fixing their cabin. And you never said a damn word.” He planted his hands on his hips, glared at her. “Nothing. You let me think you were some wounded angel dropped from the sky, unlike any I’d ever met before, and I was going to be the one to save you.” The laugh that spilled from him was cold, harsh, brittle. “But you’re no angel. You’re a woman without a conscience.”
“No.” She shook her head. “Don’t say that.”
“You played me, didn’t you? From the very beginning.”
The tears started up again, clogged her speech. “That’s not true. I cared about you. I care about you,” she corrected.
“Sure you do.” Pete rubbed his jaw, sighed. “You care so much you forgot to tell me you were going to destroy peopleIcare about, including my father.”
“I didn’t know he was your father, and I didn’t know you were from Magdalena…not at first.” Her words spilled over him, begged him to understand.
“You had a good idea I wasn’t just a stranger to the Desantros, though, didn’t you?”
“The truth? I was more interested in getting to knowyouand the more I learned, the more I wanted to mean something to you.”
Pete tried to spot the lies in those words. Damn, but he couldn’t see them. That didn’t mean they weren’t there. He had to protect himself, even if it meant he’d be the one telling the lies. “You wanted to mean something to me, huh?” Those hazel eyes glistened with fresh tears as she nodded. He opened his mouth, let the lies spill. It was the only way to save himself from a world of misery. “We were pretending, remember? None of what happened in the cabin was real. We needed a break and a little physical companionship, and that’s exactly what we got.” He clenched and unclenched his fist, forced out the rest while he still had the guts to do it. “I don’t know about you, but the touchy-feely stuff I unloaded on you? That was for your benefit because women like a man who’s got feelings.”
“You...you made it all up? You’re not broke, your girlfriend didn’t dump you…you didn’t lose your house and cars…”
It hurt to smile, but he made those damn lips freeze in place. How else could he convince her to believe his lies? This was about self-preservation and survival—his. Pete shrugged as if the answers didn’t matter. She stared at him so long he thought any second she’d lunge at him, go for his eyes, his face, maybe his groin. But she didn’t. Elissa, whose last name he didn’t know, swiped her cheeks one last time, straightened her shoulders, turned, and walked toward the house, taking any hope of a second chance and happiness with her.
* * *
When Nate gotthe phone call from Jack saying he needed to see him right away, he thought it had to do with the old guy’s health. Or his wife’s. Dolly Finnegan battled extra pounds and rising blood sugar, but she refused to give up the chocolate eclairs from the bakery. Or the bacon. Jack tried to help, but he had no patience for those who refused to do what they needed to; he usually ended up in a shouting match with Dolly, which elevatedhisblood pressure and gave him a headache.
The Finnegans had been married a lot of years, raised five children, and made a vow early on never to go to bed mad. According to Dolly, they’d kept that vow, but when Jack called today, he’d sounded on edge and jittery, like he was about to explode.
Nate hoped it wasn’t his health or Dolly’s. Or something to do with Pete.
Pete Finnegan was a wild card. They’d all heard about the money he’d made in real estate, the houses, the cars, the travel. The women. And then they’d heard he’d lost it all. Some said it was gambling. Others said a woman took it. Still others said it was bad luck and a worse market. Who could tell?
Nate didn’t care. He didn’t even care if the guy once owned suits that cost more than some of Nate’s tools. Not his business. Not anybody’s business. He scratched his jaw, sighed. Tell that to the residents of Magdalena. They’d be sniffing around and making up tales that belonged on television or in the tabloids. Pete should be back in town in a few days, and then the cabin could go up for sale, and Christine could put one more sad memory behind her.
They’d had a few “lively” discussions about her father’s letters, and Christine had agreed that his mother and Lily should receive theirs. Harry’s letter was the problem. How could Christine think any good could come from letting the guy read it? Harry was soft and kind, good-natured and a friend to kids and animals. It would destroy him, and Nate was not going to watch that happen. One way or another, that letter was getting burned or shredded.
Harry would never know it existed. Nate just needed a little more time to persuade his wife that this was the right decision. He tossed the pencil on his desk, rubbed his eyes, yawned. The baby had been up most of the night with an earache and that meant no sleep for anybody. The joys of family life. Another yawn. He wouldn’t trade it for anything…
“Am I disturbing your nap?”
Nate looked up, squinted at his old friend. “Hey, Jack. Come on in.” Jack Finnegan removed his ball cap, closed the office door, and sat in one of the chairs opposite Nate’s desk. His weather-beaten face looked pale beneath the perpetual tan, his cheeks crisscrossed with lines of worry. Damn, but Nate bet this had to do with Dolly. “What’s going on?”
Jack shook his head, his blue eyes settling on Nate. “I’m ashamed of what I’m about to tell you, Nate. Ashamed it happened in the first place, but more ashamed I didn’t own up to it a long time ago.” There was a pause, followed by two throat clearings, and then silence.
Nate waited a few more seconds before he spoke. “You’re going to have to help me out here because I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Jack toyed with the ball cap in his hands, dragged his gaze to Nate’s. “There’s no fancy way to say it, except to say it and tell you I’m real sorry.” One more throat clearing. “I take it you didn’t get a letter from somebody today that had to do with your dead mother-in-law?”
Thatgot his attention. Nate leaned forward, hands flat on the top of the desk. “No, I didn’t get any letter. Why? Who’s she trying to blackmail now?” How the hell could a dead woman still be trying to destroy families? And what did Jack have to do with it?
“She’s after me this time.” He paused, bit his lower lip. “That’s not true. She’s still after you, but she’s going to use me to do it. If you didn’t get the letter yet, I hear it’s on its way.”
“And how do you know this?”
“Sources. Pete called to warn me. How he found out about this whole mess is a mystery, but I think there’s a woman involved somewhere along the way. And I think she’s the one that’s got something to do with the letter. That’s all I know.”
